This paper investigates the in-plane stability of fixed shallow arches. The shape of the arches is parabolic and the uniformly distributed load is used in the study. The nonlinear governing equilibrium equation of the general arch is adopted to derive the incremental form of the load-displacement relationship and the buckling load of the fixed shallow arches. From the results, it is found that buckling modes (symmetric or asymmetric) of the arches are closely related to the dimensionless rise H, which is the function of slenderness ratio and the rise to span ratio of such arches. Moreover, the threshold of different buckling modes and buckling load for fixed shallow arches are proposed. A series of finite element analysis are conducted and then compared with proposed ones. From the comparative study, the proposed formula provides the good prediction of the buckling load of fixed shallow arches.